This is my first Decker funeral, since my family didn’t care about throwing one for themselves because we all had each other and didn’t need anyone else, not coworkers or old friends. Maybe if I’d gone to others I’d be ready for the way Jenn Lori speaks directly to me and not the other attendees. It makes me feel vulnerable and seen, and it gets me teary eyed, like when someone sings “Happy Birthday” to me—seriously, every year, it never fails.

Failed.

“. . . You never cried even though you had every reason to, like you were trying to prove something. The others . . .” Jenn Lori doesn’t turn to the Plutos, not even a little. She doesn’t break eye contact, like we’re in a staring contest. Respect. “They all cried, but your eyes were so sad, Rufus. You didn’t look at any of us for a couple days. I was convinced if someone posed as me you wouldn’t have known any better. Your hollowness was heavy until you found friends, and more.”

I turn and Aimee won’t take her eyes off me—same sad look she gave me when she broke up with me.

“I always felt good when you were all together,” Francis says.

He’s not talking about tonight, I know that. Dying sucks, I bet, but getting locked up in prison while life keeps going on without you has gotta be worse.

Francis keeps staring but doesn’t say anything else. “We don’t have all day.” He waves Malcolm over. “Your turn.”

Malcolm steps to the center of the room, his hunched back to the kitchen. He clears his throat, and it’s harsh, like he’s got something stuck in his pipes, and some spit flies out of his mouth. He’s always been a mess, the kind of dude who will unintentionally embarrass you because he has bad table manners and no filter. But he can also tutor you in algebra and keep a secret, and that’s the stuff I would talk about if I were giving his eulogy. “You were—you are our bro, Roof. This is bullshit. Total fucking bullshit.” His head hangs low as he picks at the cuticles on his left hand. “They should take me instead.”

“Don’t say that. Seriously, shut up.”

“I’m serious,” he says. “I know no one’s living forever, but you should live longer than others. You matter more than other people. That’s life. I’m this big nothing who can’t keep a job bagging groceries, and you’re—”

“Dying!” I interrupt, standing. I’m heated and I punch him mad hard in the arm. Not saying sorry either. “I’m dying and we can’t trade lives. You’re not a big nothing, but you can step your damn game up anyway.”

Tagoe stands, massaging his neck, beating back a twitch. “Roof, I’ll miss you shutting us up like this. You stop me from assassinating Malcolm whenever he eats off our plates and doesn’t flush twice. I was ready to see your damn mug until we were old.” Tagoe takes off his glasses, wiping his tears with the back of his hand, and closes it into a tight fist. He looks up, like he’s waiting for some Death piñata to drop from the ceiling. “You’re supposed to be a lifer.”

No one says anything, they just cry harder. The sound of everyone grieving me before I’m gone gives me crazy chills. I wanna console them and stuff, but I can’t snap out of my daze. I spent a lot of time feeling guilty for living after I lost my family, but now I can’t beat this weird Decker guilt for dying, knowing I’m leaving this crew behind.

Aimee steps up to the center and we all know this is about to get mad real. Brutal. “Is it lame to say I think I’m stuck in a nightmare? I always thought everyone was being so dramatic when they said that: ‘This feels like a nightmare.’ Like, really, that’s all you feel when tragedy happens? I don’t know how I wanted them to feel, but I can say now they hit the nail on the head. There’s another cliché for you, whatever. I want to wake up. And if I can’t wake up, I want to go to sleep forever where there’s a chance I dream everything beautiful about you, like how you looked at me for me and not because you wanted to gawk at this fuckery on my face.”

Aimee touches her heart, choking on her next words. “It hurts so much, Rufus, to think you won’t be around for me to call or hug and . . .” She stops looking at me; she’s squinting at something behind me, and her hand drops. “Did someone call the police?”

I jump out of my seat and see the flashes of red and blue in front of the duplex. I’m in full-on panic mode that feels insanely brief and mad long, like eight forevers. There’s only one person who isn’t surprised or freaking out. I turn to Aimee and her eyes follow mine back to Peck.

“You didn’t,” Aimee says, charging toward him. She snatches her phone from him.

“He assaulted me!” Peck shouts. “I don’t care if he’s on his way out!”

“He’s not expired meat, he’s another human being!” Aimee shouts back.

Holy shit. I don’t know how Peck did it because he hasn’t made any calls here, but he got the cops on me at my own funeral. I hope Death-Cast calls that bastard in the next few minutes.

“Go out the back,” Tagoe says, twitches running wild.

“You have to come with me, you guys were there.”

“We’ll slow them down,” Malcolm says. “Talk them out of it.”

There’s a knock on the door.

Jenn Lori points at the kitchen. “Go.”

I grab my helmet, walking backward toward the kitchen, taking in all the Plutos. My pops once said goodbyes are “the most possible impossible” ’cause you never wanna say them, but you’d be stupid not to when given the shot. I’m getting cheated out of mine because the wrong person showed up at my funeral.

I shake my head and run out the back, catching my breath. I rush through the backyard we all hated because of relentless mosquitoes and fruit flies, then hop the fence. I sneak back around to the front of the house to see if there’s a chance I can grab my bike before having to book it on my feet. The cop car is parked outside, but both officers must be inside, maybe even in the backyard by now if Peck snitched. I grab my bike and run with it down the sidewalk, hopping onto the seat once I get enough momentum.

I don’t know where I’m going, but I keep going.

I lived through my funeral, but I wish I was already dead.

MATEO

2:52 a.m.

The third time was not the charm. I can’t even tell you if Elle is actually a Decker, but I blocked her without investigating because she spammed me with links to “funny snuff videos gone wrong.” I closed the app afterward. Have to admit it, I feel a little vindicated in how I’ve lived my life because people can be the worst. It’s hard to have a respectful conversation, let alone make a Last Friend.

I keep receiving pop-up notifications for new messages, but I ignore them because I’m on the tenth level of A Dark Vanishing, this brutal Xbox Infinity game that has me wanting to look up cheat codes. My hero, Cove, a level-seventeen sorcerer with fire for hair, can’t advance through this poverty-stricken kingdom without an offering to the princess. So I walk (well, Cove walks) past all the hawkers trying to sell off their bronze pins and rusty locks and go straight for the pirates. I must’ve gotten lost in my head on the way to the harbor because Cove steps on a land mine and I don’t have time to ghost-phase through the explosion—Cove’s arm flies through a hut’s window, his head rockets into the sky, and his legs burst completely.